County library adjusts to new computer system

The Garland County Library is “ironing out the kinks” in its new $ 150,000 SirsiDynix cloud computer system, Library Director John Wells said.

The library was closed June 4- 6 and reopened June 7 for the installation of the cloud computer system.

Wells said it usually takes about three weeks to resolve unexpected glitches that

arise when new computer systems are installed in libraries.

“There’s going to be kinks, we haven’t even been open with it for a week,” Wells said Thursday.

“We have a few problems that are being addressed. Every day we find something. The first week or so is kind of hairy.

“I don’t think there’s anything un- fixable. It is a new system, it’s going to be different. There are indeed glitches in the installation of a highly technical, integrated library system.”

Wells said the new computer system requires library patrons to use a personal identification number to access the system. He said the PIN is the last four digits of a patron’s phone number.

“It’s not the same as it used to be,” he said.

Wells said library staff had not until Thursday switched eight of the library’s “big desktop” computers located near the library’s reference section to the cloud computer network.

“We had not switched those computers out, we had not turned them back on, the public has not been able to use those because the service was intermittent. They could be right in the middle of something and it would just stop,” Wells said.

Wells said it’s more important for library staff “to check people in and out and handle their old- fashioned library needs than it is to make sure they get on the Internet.”

Wells said the library’s e- book policy, in which books can be downloaded to personal computers, has changed with the implementation of the new computer system. He said the library’s e- books, licensed to the Overdrive Co., a global distributor of e- books and audio books, can now only be downloaded in Garland County. He said that under the library’s previous system Saline County residents could access Overdrive and check out e- books.

“The only people who can use Overdrive are those who live in Garland County or have property in Garland County,” Wells said. “We told a lot of those people, especially those on the Saline County side of Hot Springs Village that the Saline County Library has the same Overdrive system.”